


stay around (and hang out?)

by call_me_steve



Series: whumptober 2020 [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Blood and Injury, Bonding, Day 1: Waking Up Restrained, Day 9: "Take me Instead", Gen, Gunshot Wounds, Hurt Damian Wayne, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt Tim Drake, Hurt/Comfort, Identity Reveal, Maybe - Freeform, Protective Damian Wayne, Protective Tim Drake, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:15:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26917195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/call_me_steve/pseuds/call_me_steve
Summary: It starts like this: They’re all in a nearby city, doing their best to stop a minor prison break.They get a report- someone’s spotted Harley Quinn nearby. Robin offers to chase after her. Red Robin says he’s already working on tracking her down. Batman sends both of them to take her down, with orders to not let the other out of their sight.“Stay together,” he says. “Be safe and stay on the comms.”They fail to do every single one.-Or, Damian and Tim get captured by a Harley Quinn knock-off. She's looking for someone to beat around, and Damian offers to take Tim's place.
Relationships: Tim Drake & Damian Wayne
Series: whumptober 2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1966846
Comments: 14
Kudos: 199





	stay around (and hang out?)

**Author's Note:**

> CAN U BELIEVE I FORGOT THE SUMMARY IM
> 
> (nov. 16: this just in, a sequel is UP babey!! check it out: [when this is over (let's hang?)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27594926/chapters/67506341))

It starts like this: They’re all in a nearby city, doing their best to stop a minor prison break. Spoiler and Black Bat are already in the heat of it, taking down escaped convicts by the handful. Red Hood dives into the chaos alongside Nightwing, both grinning wide with the exhilaration of battle. Signal races by, leaping over the falling form of one of the escapees. Robin and Red Robin hang near Batman, waiting for their orders. 

Then they get a report- someone’s spotted Harley Quinn nearby. Robin offers to chase after her. Red Robin says he’s already working on tracking her down. Batman sends both of them to take her down, with orders to not let the other out of their sight.

“Stay together,” he says. “Be safe and stay on the comms.” 

It _happens_ like this: Red Robin tracks Harley down. He slips into the alley she’d disappeared into and tells her to stop. In the corner of his eye, he can see the yellow-black flash of Robin’s cape on the rooftop above them. Red Robin counts to three.

Harley goes to turn around, and Robin pounces- 

He gets tossed to the side like a rag doll by a goon three times his size, just as Red Robin is plucked up from the ground by another. That’s about when Red Robin loses track of what happens to Robin- he’s too focused on the growing numbers of attackers and the pummeling fists that assault him. Somewhere in the fight he gets knocked to the ground- his comm slips out of his ear and a gun goes off.

Everything goes white.

And then Tim wakes up.

* * *

When Tim wakes up, the pain radiating through his leg becomes nigh unbearable. He shoves it into the back of his mind as best as he can do and catalogs his surroundings and injury. The first thing he notices, besides the pain, is the dull throb of his shoulders and the awkward position he’s been forced into. His wrists have been shackled high above his head. If he were standing, he’d have a lot more slack. 

Right now, he’s spread out on the floor, legs stretched out before him. Tim notices that a good portion of his pant leg has been cut away, the skin beneath stained red. There’s a large white patch where he assumes the bullet had entered- whoever’s captured them had been kind enough to bandage up his leg, so he didn’t bleed out while unconscious. 

Just before him sits a large metal door. From the looks of it, it’s _heavy._ There’s no way that Tim will be able to push it open right now- not half exhausted and riddled with pain like this. Other than that, there’s no other exits from what he can tell. When he peers up to look at how well his cuffs have been fixed to the ceiling, he sees Damian’s classical stoplight-red tunic. It’s difficult to turn around enough to actually _see_ without pulling at his shoulders, but he finds he can turn enough to see most of Damian without having to crane his neck too far. 

Unlike how they have Tim restrained, they’ve got Damian hanging upside down. His ankles have been roped to the ceiling and each other, and his wrists have been pinned together with a thick metal slab molded to fit his skinny arms. His hands and feet are bare, and from the looks of it, he’s missing his belt and cape. Without the belt, his tunic rides up enough to expose his black undershirt. He’s still got his mask on, Tim notes, thankfully. But, alas, Tim _also_ notices that he’s awake. 

Annoyingly awake, apparently, since he chooses to greet Tim by hissing, “This is _your_ fault, you know.” Damian does his best to glare, but the way he’s been tied up leaves him slowly spinning in lazy circles, so he ends up facing away from Tim halfway through his complaint. “Father would be _sorely_ disappointed in you if he’d seen your sorry excuse for a _fight-”_

Tim _can_ glare at Damian, and happily does so. “I’d ask if you needed me to hold your hand if you’re scared, but I _honestly_ don’t care. Why don’t you do us _both_ a favor and _shut up?”_

It’s alarming to realize that even talking _that_ much leaves him tired. He droops forward in his restraints and hisses at the pull in his shoulders, and decides to lean back instead. His head rolls to hang back, too, leaving him with a clear view of Damian’s lower legs. He assumes that they haven’t been chained up that long. Damian’s still roaring to fight, after all. 

Damian waits long enough to face Tim again, before spitting out, “You _wretched-”_

Whatever Damian’s idea of a scathing insult is right now, Tim doesn’t hear it. He blocks it out and shuts his eyes. His relationship with Damian isn’t normally this fraught- they’ve been better, lately. Instead of only insults, there’s always that backwards compliment and those rare moments of peaceful co-existence. They don’t even physically fight anymore. In fact, Tim would say that they actually _tolerate_ each other. 

All of that goes as far as to say that Damian’s _scared_ about something. Worried, maybe. Upset? Something’s bothering him, at least, and he’s trying to focus his attention elsewhere, by opening his stupid mouth. It’s not helping Tim, in any case. 

He rotates his wrists, trying to see how loose the cuffs are. He probably can’t slip them without a bit of momentum first, which means he can safely count out having working arms. Either he shatters his hand getting out of them, or he leaves them hanging and risks damaging the muscles in his shoulders. _Great choice, life,_ he thinks. _Just wonderful._

“You had _better not_ be falling asleep, you damned _moron,”_ Damian grumbles. He sounds louder upside down, somehow. “Open your eyes and tell me what you can remember- I assume you’re tragically injured, so be certain to _regale_ me with an extensive list of everything that _hurts_ so I can know how useless you’ll be in aiding our escape.” 

Tim picks his head up with a groan. “It’s nice that you’re so worried about me, Robin, it really is.” 

“I am not _worried.”_ Damian sounds horribly offended by the mere notion. “Now, report. What do you remember?” 

It’s an easy question, but speaking seems to be a hard task to accomplish. Still, he manages to tell Damian about being attacked from behind. At one point, he’d been dropped and smacked so hard he flew to the ground and possibly hit his head- and then the gun had gone off and the bullet had torn through his calf. As he “regales” Damian with his list of injuries, he registers the dull throbbing in his temples and wishes he could massage them to relieve the tension. He should be worried about a possible concussion, but he doesn’t think it’s all that likely. What he does report is the ache in his shoulders, questioning how long he’s been roped up for. 

_“I_ have been awake for roughly half an hour,” Damian reports, smugly, like he’s better than Tim for rousing earlier. “I assume that we got here less than an hour ago. Before that, I believe we were being transported via some sort of truck. I’m unsure as to how long.” 

“Well, I hate to break it to you, but I don’t think I’m going anywhere on this leg of mine,” Tim says, in lieu of continuing that train of thought. 

When he can, Damian lets his eyes trail down to the offending appendage. He clicks his tongue annoyingly and decides to report what _he_ last remembers. There had been five men in addition to the women they’d been tracking, who Damian doubts is actually _their_ Harley Quinn. From what Tim gathers, Damian had only been thrown about. The kid happily reports that he’d suffered _“no injuries that will hinder their escape, unlike_ you, _Red Robin.”_

Tim assumes this to be a lie. 

“Whoever our abductors are, they’re clearly smart,” Tim notes, when Damian finishes. “They took our belts and half your suit-” He stops talking, trying to figure out if Damian would take any continued comment wrongly. It’s _cold_ where they are- wherever that is. Tim’s still got his cape, gloves, and his boots. Plus, he’s a lot more acclimated to the local climate than Damian is. There’s no _way_ that Damian isn’t freezing. 

Under his domino mask, Damian’s nose crinkles up and his brows furrow together. “Perhaps they realize that I’m more of a threat than you are- though I’m not sure I see how stripping me of my boots and gloves would help-” 

“You could probably slip out of your restraints if you were still wearing your boots and gloves,” Tim points out. Damian snarls at his audacity. “They’re thicker than mine, after all.” 

“I _suppose.”_

Dealing with Damian is _frustrating,_ Tim realizes, not for the first time. He’d rather be stuck with almost anyone else in the _world,_ rather than Damian. Tim tries to vent his frustrations by glaring at Damian out of the corner of his eye, but stops short as he watches as Damian bends his upper half upward, reaching out with his hands to grab at the ropes around his ankles. Once he’s bent in half and his head isn’t upside down anymore, he awkwardly hangs there for a moment, fiddling with his restraints minutely. Then he swings back down with a wheeze- just the simple crunch-like movement must’ve taken a lot out of him. 

That, Tim recognizes, isn’t a good sign. Neither is the way that Damian’s skin goes a little paler as he rocks to a stop. 

“We’ve been gone for long enough for our absence to be alarming,” Damian comments, after a bit. “We haven’t reported anything via our comms, either, so Father must know that something is wrong. I presume that he’s looking for us as we speak.” His eyes shift over to peer at Tim, before his momentum turns him around. _“One_ of us, at least.” 

“I’m not in the _mood_ for petty ‘squabbling’, Robin-”

“Why? Is it because you know that Father would _gladly_ leave-” 

Something rattles. Like a switch has been flicked inside of him, Damian falls silent and stares holes into the door. Tim does his best to keep his chin up and his gaze hard. After a beat of silence, the door swings open and their faux-Harley Quinn steps through the door, one of her henchmen trailing behind her. 

Seeing her now really makes Tim wonder how they ever mistook her for the real deal. For one thing, she’s much shorter than Harley. The tips of her strawberry blonde hair have been dyed an electric pink. Earlier, she’d had it up in pigtails. Now it flows down past the small of her back, braided loosely with pink bands. She’d been wearing a Harley Quinn-esque outfit earlier, too. Now she’s dressed in dark overall shorts that expose her legs, sneakers (that Tim _swears_ are actually light-up sketchers that just don’t work anymore), and a pristine, white lab coat. 

“Hello _boys!”_ she _chirps,_ and Tim feels a shiver race up his spine. She sounds young- her eyes are wide and there’s a smattering of freckles spanning over her nose and cheeks. “I’m going to need one of _you_ two to come along with me. There’s a few _statements_ we need to make to the public and I’m going to need-” -she moves forward and _boops Damian on the nose._ Damian snaps his teeth at her, and she moves on to tap Tim’s nose next- _“your_ help! Exciting, isn’t it?” 

“I,” Damian replies, curtly, “am going to skin your hands if you dare touch me again, you _harlot-”_

The woman- Quinn, Tim decide to call her, for simplicity's sake- looks taken aback by Damian’s words, and actually _blinks_ as if she’s a deer caught in someone’s headlights. “That’s not very nice,” she says, with a frown. She waves at her henchmen to draw closer-

Tim can’t stop his heart from racing, can’t keep himself from saying, “I’ll go with you-” 

He’s been in enough hostage situations as Robin, Red Robin, _and_ Timothy Jackson Drake-Wayne alike to understand the risks of upsetting your captors. While Jason- and Damian, apparently- always opt to piss off their abductors, Tim would rather keep themselves _safe_ like Bruce had requested by just following along with their orders. Besides, it’s not like he’s going to let them take Damian out of here without him- who _knows_ what they’ll do to him? As much as Tim doesn’t _like_ Damian, he’s not about to go hand him off to an insane _kidnapper._ And, hopefully, his intervention is enough to keep Quinn from remembering that Damian just pissed her _off-_

“Oh, goodie! I thought that this was going to be a lot more difficult! I’m so glad that you’re willing to work with me. Jon, if you could plea-” 

“Are you _kidding_ me?” Damian snarls, cutting her off. Quinn’s brow twitches in response. “You can’t take _him._ He can’t _walk._ He’s _useless!”_

If Tim could stand, and if his wrists weren’t chained above his head, he thinks that he would strangle Damian. Smack him around a little. Maybe _duck tape his stupid mouth shut,_ because: “What are you _doing,_ Robin-?” 

“At least I can _walk,_ unlike _him._ Leave him here- take me instead.” 

_“Robin-”_

Quinn blinks again, just as doe-like as the first time, before her features curl up into one much more vicious and snake like. Her lips thin as she smiles, not showing any teeth. “That sounds good to me! We _did_ put in so much work to patch that boo-boo up- I wouldn’t want all of our hard work to go to waste. Jon, if you could please take him down.” 

The way she says _I wouldn’t want all of our hard work to go to waste_ forces another shiver up Tim’s spine, and he’s hit with the horrible realization that as soon as Damian leaves with her, he’s _going to get hurt._ “Hey-” he tries. “Hey- you can’t-” 

The glare that Jon hits him with makes Tim shrink back in his shackles. He assumes that anything he says now will be used as fuel for the fire they’re about to set- _but,_ Tim thinks. _Damian can still fight. He said he’s not injured. He_ said _he could escape._ Tim’s seen Damian fight and he knows that Quinn hadn’t fought them in that alley, so she might not _know_ how to fight. That leaves Damian against Jon- Damian can take him. Tim _hopes_ Damian can take him-

And then Jon hisses, “Try anything and your _buddy_ gets hurt,” into Damian’s ear as he yanks at the ropes around Damian’s ankles. Jon doesn’t try to catch Damian as he tumbles down from the ceiling and Damian hits the ground like a sack of bricks, rolling over onto his side with a high pitched whine. 

“You could’ve broken his _neck!”_ Tim cries, without thinking. He jostles his shackles until they clink together. “What the _hell_ is _wrong with you-”_

“Get up,” Jon orders. His voice is deep, a low, gravely baritone. 

Slowly, Damian pushes himself to his feet- and _wobbles._ His knees nearly give out beneath him before he can right himself, so he forces his heels together and stands as straight as he can, facing Quinn and Jon with his head held high. “Ready,” he says, in a voice that only Tim can notice the waver in. 

“Perfect,” says Quinn, stepping out the door. And-

And then they’re gone. 

* * *

With no other options, Tim settles in to wait for them to bring Damian back. He strains his ears and tries to hold himself in a position that aches the least, staring at the door like Bruce is going to step right through at any moment.

He waits, and he waits, and he waits.

Through the suffocating silence, Tim’s ears become acutely aware of the sound of dripping water nearby. When he cranes his head to find it- it’s starting to drive him _crazy-_ he finds a tiny crack in the ceiling, not too far from where his shackles have been bolted up. It must be raining, Tim thinks. They must be above ground, or just below the surface, too. 

Another thing he becomes aware of is the fact that _no sound_ makes its way into the room he’s in. The only sounds he’s heard so far have come from the door or inside the room. Whatever’s past this box- Tim has no idea. The walls must be thick. Soundproofed. 

Cells are made like that to prevent people from calling for help. Cells are _made like that_ to keep people isolated- and to keep the world isolated from them. 

Tim’s stomach flips. He _knows_ they’re doing something to Damian. Even if he can’t hear any yelling or shouting, he knows that, whatever they’re doing, it’s not going to be good. His mind supplies him with ideas- maybe they’ve got Damian sitting in front of a camera, waiting for a buyer. Maybe they’re throwing him around, yelling at him to give answers he’ll never give. Maybe it’s worse. Maybe they’re just doing this for the hell of it. They’ll beat him until he can’t stand, break his bones until the damage becomes irreparable-

But she’d said that she didn’t want to take Tim because then all her “hard work” would “go to waste”. That has to mean something, doesn’t it? She doesn’t want Tim any more hurt than he is- and he’s very hurt, or so he assumes, since he feels like he’s getting sleepier even as his leg continues to scream at him. But he’s trying not to focus on that- so that _has_ to mean that she won’t tear Damian apart. He’ll come back in one piece. He’ll come back _breathing._

He _has to._

Bruce had said that he wanted them to stay together. He wanted them to stay safe and stay on the comms. So far, Tim’s disobeyed every one of those orders. He has a bullet wound in his leg. His comms are littered in some back alley. He doesn’t even have _Damian_ here anymore. No matter _how_ annoying he’d been, Tim doesn’t want him to get hurt. It’s like he said- they’re _better,_ now. 

That makes Tim think back to when Damian had snarled, _One of us, at least._ Then he’d started to snap that Bruce would _gladly_ leave Tim behind if he could- only to step in three minutes later, and take Tim’s place. 

Tim had been right- Damian was only acting out because he was scared, or worried, or upset- He was acting out because he was feeling like a child should, in a situation like this. He didn’t _mean_ to bark at Tim. Or, maybe he did, but-

Once upon a time, Dick had told Tim that, most of the time, when Damian insulted him, it wasn’t because he _hated_ him. It was because Damian felt threatened, somehow, and lashing out was the only way he knew how to deal with it. And since he couldn’t lash out violently, he chose to use his words as bloody weapons. _Don’t tell him I told you this,_ he’d said, _but Damian only ‘hated’ you at first because he felt like you threatened his security in the family. Actually, he doesn’t really_ hate _you, either. Or anyone in the house, really. Well- I’m not sure about Jay, but you get it, don’t you?_

That had been way back when Tim _had_ hated Damian. He’d figured that Dick had been lying and had shoved his words aside, until the day that Damian had started to make an effort to fix their relationship. Tim started working on his side of the road at that point, and now-

Now they’re here. Tim’s here. Damian’s gone, and Tim has no idea if he’s _safe_ or he’s _dying,_ and he’s only just realizing that maybe Damian wasn’t saying that Bruce wouldn’t bother to come for Tim.

Maybe he was saying that Bruce wouldn’t bother to come for _him._

It’s at this point when Tim starts yelling. 

The walls are soundproof, but Tim yanks on his chains and screams his head off, acting like a mad man. His gloves keep him from seriously damaging his wrists by chafing them, but they still feel sore by the time he decides to give it a rest to save his voice. 

“C’mon, B,” he whispers, leaning his head down. He squeezes his eyes shut and breathes in through his nose, trying to push the ache in his back down with the pain in his leg. “Where _are you-?”_

The door opens. Tim’s head bounds up and his heart leaps in his chest- but it’s only Quinn and another henchmen, this one with a shock of messy brown hair blooming from his head. Quinn smiles, and Tim notices that her white coat has been splattered red.

His heart sinks as he stares at the drying splotch on the bottom hem. It looks far too close to looking like a handful of fingerprints for Tim’s liking. 

Besides the coat, Quinn’s long braid looks frizzy, now. Her eyes are wild, shifting around like she’s looking for what to beat on next. “I bet you’re tired,” she says, and her voice sounds breathless. “I thought that maybe you could use a little bit of a break from those cuffs of yours! Christopher here is going to-” 

Tim cuts her off, forcing out, “Where’s Robin?”, in one quick breath. “What’d you _do_ to him?” 

Quinn frowns, her trigger-happy state shifting backwards into the unhinged zone. “He’ll be right back, so don’t worry about a thing, okay? Now- As I was saying- Christopher here is going to change your cuffs out so we don’t ruin those shoulders of yours! We can’t let any more precious cargo go to waste, after all!” 

_Precious cargo_ burns a hole into Tim’s brain, and he feels the pit in his stomach grow infinitely deeper. She’s not going to hurt Tim anymore, but- _Any more_ implies that she _has_ hurt Damian. 

Her wording also implies that she’s probably going to sell them off. Gotham vigilantes go for a lot on the black market, apparently- there’s the chance that you’ll get to try and break them in like a dog, tear them apart like an old toy, or unmask them for the world to see. Tim doesn’t want any of that to happen. Not to him, not to Damian- 

_C’mon Bruce,_ he thinks. _Hurry up. We need you._

But- she’d said _he’ll be right back._

That means Damian’s still _alive,_ at the very least. He’s breathing and he’ll be coming back. 

_Good._

Christopher steps close, reaching up to yank Tim’s chains down from the ceiling. Tim hisses as his arms are let down without warning, a rough burn rushing down his spine. As Christopher changes the anchor to the floor, Tim tries to roll his shoulders out a bit. There’s no more pressure on them- he lets himself slump forward, leaning his head down far enough that his hair ghosts the floor. It’d be a good opportunity for him to try and attack- if he didn’t have an uncooperative leg and a bite-sized hero to think about. 

The chains now go down to the center of the floor, giving Tim enough slack to pace the perimeter of the room if he could walk. He tests it by laying down, spread eagle, once Christopher returns to Quinn’s side, and turns his head to watch Quinn peak out into the- presumed- hall. The only thing he can see beyond the door is the same ugly grey walls, which is no help to his situation right now.

“Oh!” says Quinn, drawing in Tim’s attention. Oh _what?_ “Here’s Jon now!” 

Tim lets himself sink further into the floor in relief.

Once Quinn gestures for Christopher to wait in the hall, she motions for Jon to step into the room. As soon as Jon finds himself in the doorway, he shoves something forward, and it tumbles into the room-

_“Robin!”_ Tim shouts, throwing himself into a sitting position. 

He watches as Damian stumbles, his knees buckling beneath him and sending him careening to the floor. His wrists are still bound, from what little Tim can see before Damian curls in on himself. He lets out a little gasp when he hits the ground. Tim can’t see enough skin to tell how badly injured Damian is- his head rests close to Tim’s injured leg and his hair looks like it’s shining with blood. 

There’s blood all over the floor, a trail of it curling around the doorway and back whatever way they came.

Tim feels _his_ blood boil. They’d made him _walk_ here with whatever injuries they’ve given him. They’d _dragged him_ on his feet while he was probably bleeding _out-_

Whatever Quinn says is lost on him, but Jon moves forward and Tim’s instincts flare up. “Don’t _touch him,”_ Tim hisses. “He’s had enough- just leave him alone-” 

Again, Jon glares at him. He ignores Tim, moving forward to seize Damian by his wrists, hoisting him up into a sitting position. Damian moans in pain at the movement, squeezing his eyes shut, but his position gives Tim a clear view of his face-

His mask is gone. 

His _mask is gone,_ and in its place is a sheen of sparkling, drying red. Some of it, closer to his temples, is flaking off, already dark crimson. The rest looks like it’s been smeared over his opposite eye and the bridge of his nose, only working to accent his blazing green eyes. They look dull, red, and puffy, now. Clear tear tracks burn pathways through the sea of red on his face, and Tim can’t help but notice the odd angle his nose has been bent at.

There’s no mistaking his identity. Quinn has to _know_ that she has a Wayne boy in her grasp now. She has to know that she has _two of them._

Blood makes another pathway over Damian’s feet, sliding down his pant legs and dripping onto the floor. That indicates a hidden injury Tim can’t see through the uniform- there’s something worse than a nose bleed and a head wound at play here.

Beneath the red mask, Damian squeezes his eyes shut as Jon ties the rope back around his ankles. Jon takes the length of it and returns it to the anchor on the ceiling, looping it through and taking the end of it into his hands. Before Tim can tell him to stop, he tugs the rope through the anchor and hoists Damian into the air. It happens so fast that Damian chokes down on his scream on accident, and then he’s hanging upside down, swinging with the momentum. 

Like nothing had even happened, Quinn wiggles her fingers in a goodbye-wave. “I’ll see you later, alright?” 

Tim just stares at her until she takes Chris and Jon away. When the door slams shut behind her, he plants his palms onto the floor and pushes, scooting himself closer to Damian. A shock of pain shoots up his body, spiraling up from his leg, but he bites down on his hiss. He can feel his heart pound in his chest as the silence stretches- he can hear Damian struggling to catch his breath as the blood that had been dripping down his legs changes direction to pool on the floor beneath him. 

“What did they _do?”_ Tim asks, repeating his scooting technique again. More pain flares up- he can barely suppress his groan this time. As he moves, he does his best to stay clear of the crimson puddle on the floor, and starts trying to awkwardly unclip his cape from his shoulders. “What _happened,_ Robin?” 

Damian squeezes his eyes shut. “I couldn't fight them. My- I _couldn't._ They took me somewhere and tied me to a chair- It was a room, like this one. They- they had cameras set up. Live feed- They wanted to auction one of us off. The buyers wanted to see proof, and-” He draws in a sharp breath through his teeth, throwing his head back as a bead of blood drips to the floor. “Someone sent in money. Told them to unmask me-” A full body shiver racks his body as Tim’s cape falls free from his shoulders. “They told them to unmask me while the cameras were rolling.” 

“And then what?” Tim spits, without thinking. His tone sounds acidic and the words taste sour. “They realized you were _twelve_ and then decided that they were gonna beat you around anyway?” 

Using the slack his chains give him, he leans back and reaches for the tiny puddle of water that crack in the ceiling had been making. He drops his cape into it and waits for a few more drops to collect on it, before he grabs it and forces himself to sit back up. The effort leaves him heaving, and the cape is barely wet, but he shifts his body closer to Damian anyways. 

“Some people aren’t in favor of the Wayne's these days.” 

Once Tim catches his breath, he reaches up for Damian’s face. Damian flinches back at the lack of a warning, and Tim mutters out a quick apology. “Yeah, well, we aren’t in favor of _them_ either,” he grumbles. 

Damian lets Tim attempt to wipe the blood away from his face without fussing. It’s such a change in attitude that Tim’s heart wrenches in his chest, and he can’t help it when he says, “You’re going to be okay, you know that, right?” 

With a glare, Damian curtly replies, “Of _course_ I know that, _Drake._ I assumed that your _mother hen act_ would cease once I allowed you to wipe my face as though I were an invalid or some sort of _child-”_

“-which you are, by the way,” Tim says. Most of the blood comes off since it’s still wet, and the rest flakes off easily enough. He has to keep taking breaks when his body begs for them since he’s so worn out, but by the time he _has_ to stop, Damian’s face is left with little more than a faint, red imprint. He can now see the actual cut itself- which is still bleeding sluggishly. “At least B probably found a way to track her down via the video feed. He’ll be here soon.” 

Damian lets his eyes slide shut. “So as long as you keep on breathing while we wait, Father will be pleased, I suppose.” 

Tim’s too tired to do anything more than mumble out, “You keep on breathing too, okay?” The fight in him has drained, and it seems like Damian's has, as well. 

So, as the building shudders, Tim lets his eyes close, too. 

**Author's Note:**

> hm,,, not that happy w/ this?? the endings a bit abrupt but i might write a second part if it seems like smone wants it lol. i just wanted to make sure this got up in time for today :) 
> 
> tumblr: [potato-reblob](https://potato-reblob.tumblr.com/)


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